Migrate OneDrive for Business files from on-premises SharePoint 2013 to Office 365

OneDrive for Business is the SharePoint Server personal library that people in your organization use to store and share their corporate work documents. By moving these documents to OneDrive for Business in an Office 365 tenant, your users can access these documents from outside of your network.

After you connect your SharePoint Server on-premises users to OneDrive for Business in Office 365, the first step is planning how your users will move their files to the cloud. This article describes methods that you can use to do this.

Migration options

There are two ways in which you can plan to migrate your users’ files from their on-premises SharePoint ServerOneDrive for Business document libraries to OneDrive for Business in Office 365:

Self-service migration: The users select the documents they want to migrate and then move them to Office 365.

Tool-based migration: The IT administrator creates or purchases a migration tool to move the content.

Self-service migration

For this option, users in your organization migrate their own files from their on-premises OneDrive for Business document library to their OneDrive for Business document libraries in Office 365. Use this option if your users have a small number of files they need to migrate.

Advantages and disadvantages of using self-service migration

Advantages

Disadvantages

Use fewer IT-resources: Users move their own files to their personal sites.

User resistance: Your users must make the effort to move their own files.

Lower cost: Cost can be much cheaper than buying a third-3rd party migration tool.

File properties are not migrated: Migrated files are recognized as new files and won’t keep file metadata.

Tools-based migration

In certain situations, self-service migration won’t be the most suitable option for you. If this is the case, you can use a migration tool from Microsoft partners to perform the migration.

Advantages and disadvantages of using a tools-based migration

Advantages

Disadvantages

Migrate large amounts of data: Better when your users have many files and large amounts of data.

Complexity: Using a tool-based migration can be complicated. You IT resources will need to test and monitor the migration process.

Considerations when selecting a migration tool

When you select a third-party tool to migrate your on-premises users’ OneDrive for Business document libraries to OneDrive for Business in Office 365, consider the following:

Tool capabilities: Understand what the tool can do. If you plan to migrate more than just user files, many tools can move much more than your on-premises document libraries (for example, your SharePoint site collections).

Cost: Costs and licensing requirements can vary by vendor.

Creating your users’ personal sites in Office 365

An additional requirement for moving users’ documents to OneDrive for Business in Office 365 is to create a personal site for each user in Office 365. There are two approaches for creating the personal sites:

Self Migration: If your users will be migrating documents themselves (self-migration), they can create their own personal sites in Office 365 by clicking the OneDrive link in the header. The Create Personal Sites permission must be enabled in the Manage User Profiles page in Central Administration for users to create their own personal sites.

Pre-provisioning: If you are using a migration tool, use Windows PowerShell to pre-provision your users’ personal sites by using the ProfileLoader.CreatePersonalSiteEnqueueBulk cmdlet. This cmdlet allows you to pre-provision personal sites for multiple users for Office 365OneDrive for Business.

How to migrate in a self-service migration

In the self-service migration scenario, users can migrate their own files by using one of the following methods:

OneDrive for Business Sync client: Users migrate their files to their OneDrive for Business for Office 365 document library by using the OneDrive for Business Sync client.

Drag and drop: Users migrate their documents by using drag and drop from Windows Explorer to their OneDrive for Business for Office 365 document library.

When you use the drag-and-drop method, you can select only the files you need. In contrast, when you use the OneDrive for Business sync client, it migrates all of your files from your sync folder location to the OneDrive for Business for Office 365 document library.

Migrate using the OneDrive for Business Sync client

The OneDrive for Business Sync client is available with Office 2013 or Office 2016, or as a free download. It allows you to synchronize your OneDrive for Business for Office 365 document library to your local computer.

This method uses a two-step process: First, you back up your on-premises OneDrive for Business document library on your local computer, and then you use the OneDrive for Business for Office 365 Sync client to copy the content of the backup folder to your online environment.